Mentor Graphics, now a Siemens subsidiary, has joined the O-RAN Alliance promoting interoperable 5G equipment standards.

Mentor will focus on verification and validation requirements for open standards-based, highly-configurable network development.

“While there are many challenges to building the products that comprise 5G networks, testing is the key to success,” says Mentor’s Joe Sawicki (pictured), “Mentor’s comprehensive silicon verification flow is ideally suited to help O-RAN and its members meet their goal of dramatically streamlining interoperability validation cycles for 5G deployments around the globe.”

O-RAN enables collaboration among a large group of companies each building a part of a 5G network. The idea is to get mny more companies competing in the space.

Mentor’s X-STEP post-silicon validation platform for mixed vendor, system level-testing of 5G components, including SoCs, baseband boards and antenna systems will be deployed.

Acquired via the company’s 2018 purchase of Finnish 5G software firm Sarokal, X-STEP works together with Mentor’s Veloce Strato hardware emulation platform to deliver a verification flow encompassing pre-silicon and post-silicon verification functionality for 5G networks.

Using this comprehensive flow, 5G network designers can conduct

• Pre-silicon SoC protocol compliance verification,
• Development-phase test case sharing between partner companies for early verification in the development phase, and
• Lab-grade verification with bit-accurate analysis of data for timing specifications and antenna configuration testing.